


Poor Career Choice

by AvecPardon



Series: Parlourverse Canon Side-Stories [1]
Category: Five Nights at Freddy's
Genre: Cross-Posted on Tumblr, Gen, Original Male Character - Freeform, fivenightsatfreddysfanfiction (blog), parlourverse au, reborniverse rewrite
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-19
Updated: 2018-12-19
Packaged: 2019-09-22 22:18:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,648
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17068187
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AvecPardon/pseuds/AvecPardon
Summary: Originally posted on Tumblr: December 2, 2014Bones' backstory for Jeremy had been mostly overwritten by my backstory for Probie, so I needed to come up with a new way for Jeremy and Mike to meet.





	Poor Career Choice

Break time. _Finally._ Chicacoo had been a pest all morning, following him around when not entertaining children and always trying to hug him or get him involved in whatever weirdness she was up to just then. Fucking Japanese bird.

Mike sighed, rubbing the back of his neck as he drew close to the manager’s office on the way to the employee break room. The screams of a birthday party taking place in Party Room 2 were still ringing in his ears; fucking Boss probably assigned it there just to send the audio bouncing through the vents into the security office. Like **hell** was he going to take night shift again after that. Too complicated a mess of crap to do to stay alive and it’d be more hellish with a migraine.

As he passed the door, it opened and a young man walked out, clutching a bundle in his arms. Too focused on getting himself out of the animatronics’ usual stomping grounds, Mike bumped into the stranger and stepped aside, ready to snap at them. He was **so** not in the mood to pretend to be nice to customers. But the color of the bundle made him stop abruptly.

Soft blue. The uniform of the security detail for Freddy Fazbear’s.

“Sorry! Excuse me! I wasn’t paying attention! Sorry!” the youngster stammered and hurried off, running as fast as their short legs could carry them.

“Hey! Wait!” Mike called out without thinking, reaching out belatedly to grab at the young man. That uniform; he _couldn’t_ be-!

The door opened again and Boss leaned out, cigar clenched between his teeth like an adult pacifier. “Eh? Who’s makin’ noise?” he grumbled before catching sight of Mike standing in the hall. “‘Ey, Mike. You see the new guy run off?”

Mike stiffened before turning to face Boss with a plastered on smile. “Uh, yeah! Didn’t get a chance to catch his name.” He had a sinking feeling, that kind of dread he only ever got when he was low on power with an hour left and Freddy was mixing up the patterns the Fazbear Band moved in.

“Jeremy Fitzgerald,” Boss replied, lifting an application and reading it off. “Name sounds familiar, but not ringing any sour bells.”

Familiar? Didn’t sound like any name Mike could recall. Then again, he couldn’t remember half his childhood so who was he to say anything?

“Hey, listen,” Boss went on, reaching out to nudge Mike’s arm with a fist. “You teach that probie better than the last one! Can’t be having night watches vanishing all the time when I’m trying to make this place look good!”

Mike’s hands clenched into fists he held tight against his body to keep out of sight, rows of bloodied nametags and notes flickering in his memory. His smile grew strained. “Yes, sir! I’ll train him better than all the rest!” He kept it up as he walked away, hurrying out of Boss’s sight and into the break room.

Oh god, not **again**. Another night guard. Mike dropped into the first chair he came across and gripped his head in both hands. One more for the fuckboys to rip into if they weren’t careful, weren’t neurotic about checking lights and cameras. How old was that probie? The youngest a hire could be was 21; that guy looked too _tiny_ to be that age. Then again, Mike’s height made everyone look so small.

God, _another_ one. How long did he have? Mike felt his stomach churn, and he grimaced as he looked up at the clock. His shift ended at 10 PM. The new guy would start same night, like always, at midnight. Two hours. He had two hours to convince them to quit.

He couldn’t handle another body, one more and he was **done**. His heart couldn’t take the pain and despair, crying out to turn cold so it would _never_ be wounded again.

This Jeremy kid **had** to go.

===

**10:00 PM**

 

Mike leaned back against the wall of the pizzeria, waiting for the probie to arrive. Boss had left with a grin that Mike wished he could punch off. Chris had given him a concerned look, patting his arm comfortingly before wishing him a good night and leaving.

Now he was alone.

Or not.

A figure on a bicycle came pedaling up to him, dressed in the night watch uniform. Mike tilted his head, silently measuring up the little guy. Kinda scrawny, face too young and nervous-looking to be 21 or older…. As the new guard walked up to him, backpack on his shoulders and weird red hipster glasses on his freckled face, Mike just sighed to himself, pulling out the prepared opening statement. Company policy.

“Hi. I’m the new night watch. I was told to come early for orientation?” God, he even _sounded_ too young for the job. Yeah, he was definitely chasing this kid out.

“You come at least an hour early every night, or you’re fucked from the start,” Mike told him, unfolding the tattered paper. The kid’s eyes widened, body tensing up. Couldn’t handle the way he talked? **Good** ; maybe that’ll put him on edge. “Ok, first, the legal bullshit.” This should be good. He cleared his throat and held up the aged paper. “Welcome to Freddy Fazbear’s Pizza, a magical place for kids and grownups alike, where fantasy and fun come to life. Fazbear Entertainment is not responsible for damage to property or person. Upon discovering that damage or death has occurred, a missing persons report will be filed after ninety days…. blah blah lawyers and denial and shit.” Mike shoved the paper back into his pocket. He hated that greeting about as much as he hated Phone Guy. “So yeah. You’re on your own once we finish basic training tonight.”

He thought that would be enough to scare the kid off. But while the new guy looked worried, there was also a strange sort of anger in his expression. _'What’s **he** pissed off about?’_ Mike scowled a bit. Usually the greeting was enough to give the guards second thoughts; didn’t seem to be working on the probie.

“Okay. When do we start training?” the kid asked. Mike pulled the glass door open and gestured to the interior as a response. The kid -forgot his name, Jimmy or some shit- gave him an odd look and walked in.

“First, equipment. You need your gear, so let’s go to the office.” Mike led the probie to the security office, looking around to be sure none of the animatronics got curious too early. He wanted to scare the kid **out** , not to _death_.

“That’s a lot of kids’ drawings,” Probie commented. Mike paused and looked back, spotting the kid standing in front of several papers on the wall. “Yours one of them?”

“Nah. Hate this place. Not gonna waste my time on a shitty drawing of a shitty pizza joint,” he dismissed bluntly and kept walking. “Hurry up, Probie. Got a lot to learn if you wanna live.” He heard quick little steps as the kid ran to join him.

“Really? You’ve never come as a kid?”

Mike felt his eye twitch. “Probie, _don’t_ fucking ask about my life. I’m just training you, **not** holding your hand.” Brat. He briefly considered just ditching him with a Freddy head and the flashlight and Phone Guy’s old messages. He wasn’t looking to play nice and make friends. …Besides… no one ever lasted long enough….

He was fine with Chris. Chris made a good drinking buddy. He was the boring sober one who sipped at lime water and kicked his ass to the ditch if he was about to puke. He didn’t **need** or **want** anyone else messing with his life, fucked up as it already was. He could _totally_ ditch the kid.

But…

He glanced aside, watching the kid. The probie looked nervous again, lips moving as though talking under his breath as his eyes looked all over, almost like-

-like he was _tracking_ something.

What the **hell**?

In the office, Mike headed to his locker and opened it, hesitating before picking up the flashlight from its place. Several rows of eyes stared at him in silence. For a moment guilt weighed on him, sorrow at the losses, then he threw it off and squared his shoulders. _'Get **rid** of this one. I don’t want this one in my locker.’_

And yet he was pulling out the camera too. **Damn** it. Fucking habit. Worse than smoking.

“Ok, Probie,” Mike began.

“My _name_ is Jeremy Fitzgerald,” the kid told him, face flushed and pouting. Mike snapped his photo. “Hey!”

“You’re the probie until you stay a week at least. Get over it.” And if he was lucky, the kid would be out the doors before midnight. “Here’s your flashlight.” He tossed it to the probie before turning away to search the boxes stacked against the back wall. “Now for the Fuckboy head…”

“I have a mask.” _'The fuck?’_ Mike turned back to stare as the kid pulled a Freddy mask from his backpack and put it on at an angle, pinning his hat in place and letting short tufts of brown hair escape it. “I practiced with the head, but it was really hard to put it on and take it off so I turned it into a mask and made the eyeholes bigger.”

Okay. Kid was clever. His respect for the new guy went up a tiny bit.

The probie gulped, eyes wandering to the side of him, like he was looking at something else past his shoulder. Mike raised an eyebrow and looked to his own shoulder. Nothing. What the hell was up with this guy staring at thin air?!

Respect point taken off. God, this place just kept getting more fucked up.

===

So far the probie managed to scream and cry at everything Mike showed him on their walk around the pizzeria. He was so tempted to shove the kid in a suit himself, _anything_ to shut him up!

“Look, kid, if you can’t handle these asswipes while they’re standing still, you’re gonna end up dead in half an hour once they start moving.” Mike folded his arms over his chest, leaning against the wall outside the bathroom while the new guy finished throwing up in one of the toilets. “Do the smart thing: **Run** the fuck _away_.” He checked his watch, stifling a yawn. God, his day had been tiring and he was pushing his limit. Thirty minutes left. If he didn’t get out before midnight….

“I’m okay. I can do this.” Probie walked out, looking paler than before and shaking. “I just have to survive the night, right?”

He took to the idea that the animatronics were going to try to kill him pretty well. …That had been the reason he spent twenty minutes hurling. Point up.

“Yeah,” Mike said and gave the kid a puzzled look. He was taking everything _surprisingly_ well, actually. “You’ve been here before? Most guards are pissin’ themselves by this point.”

“Never been to a Freddy’s Pizza before, sir. I like Checkers’ Pizza.”

For some reason, that made Mike laugh. The kid just blinked at him, the stupid mask still pressed against his head like a hat on his hat.

===

Ten minutes.

Mike didn’t like it. He told the harshest stories about the dangers of the place and the kid had gone white, eyes shifting rapidly between him and empty space, glasses skewing on his face. But he stayed.

He showed off the Prize Corner, ignoring his own rising panic as he explained the music box’s role and cranked it manually to add more charge while Probie moaned in dread, staring at the kids’ drawings of the Marionette. The kid _stayed_.

He pointed out Mangle and made a face as he wriggled his fingers, describing how she would climb to the ceilings and swoop across to bite off guards’ heads. The kid stared at him in horror. But he **stayed**.

“ _Why the hell did you take this fucking job?!_ You’re gonna wind up **dead** or _worse_!” Mike finally yelled, furious that he failed to chase this scrawny little runt off. He could already picture himself showing up the next morning to collect a new bloody nametag. “The pay is **shit**! The food is **shit**! The fucking manager is **shit**! _Why_ would you **stay** here?!”

“Have you ever had something really important that needed to be done no matter the risk it put you through?” Probie asked quietly.

_A perfect ring with a small gem, stored in a black velvet box._

“…” Mike stood there in silence, gazing at his shoes as he felt strangely put in place. Not a feeling he was used to.

“Yeah,” he finally said, raising his eyes to look at the new guy and really **see** him, “I have. I still do.”

Jeremy, with his pale freckled face and tousled brown hair and the oddly familiar red glasses he’d put away earlier, gave him a small nod. “So… I’m going to do my best, Mr. Schmidt,” he said in that quiet, almost shy voice. “Thank you, for teaching me this much.”

_Fuck._

“Where’s your phone?” Mike growled, pulling out his own. Jeremy blinked and fished a small cell phone out of his pocket. Mike grabbed it, compared the two, then tapped out his phone number and saved it to the new guard’s phone before doing the same to his own. He shoved it back into Jeremy’s hands. “You run into any trouble with the Fuckbear Band, new or old, you call me. Got it?”

“Um? Yes, s-sir?”

“Good.” God, he was going to into a shitload of trouble with this one, wasn’t he? Well, fuck it. He never did make many good decisions on a lotta shit in his life. Well, except for his decision to marry Doll. Struggled for the ring to propose with, now struggle for the funds to create the perfect night to propose on… and the wedding… the house… various essentials.

He rubbed his head hard, pulling his thoughts back. “Look, Probie. They’re gonna go easy on you tonight. They like testing out the new guys, see how they react,” he warned, trying to dredge up all he knew to survive the first night. He bullshat those two hours, fucking waste of time. He regretted every minute now. “Don’t slack off. They’ll still kill you even tonight if you give the bastards half a chance. Flashlight works best on Foxy but it might glitch the others and reset 'em for a while, stall 'em. Battery’s limited, 'cause Boss is fucking cheap as shit. Music box. Keep it wound, keep it charged. It’s all on the tablet and in that shit recording on the phone in the office. Rule one, always keep that music box wound.”

Did he choose wrong again? Did he waste too much time? Five minutes, barely enough for the new guy to reach the office before the shift started.

“Call me if you get a little over your head. Don’t wait, okay?”

The new guard was nodding, focused on him in awe and listening to every word.

“God, I wish we had more **time**. So much I need to pass on,” Mike muttered and straightened up. “Did the best I could. I better see you out here tomorrow morning, Probie.” Not enough _time_ , nowhere **near** enough. _'Fuck me sideways.’_ “Survive the night, and be careful with your usage.”

“Gotta conserve power.”

“Gotta conserve power.”

Mike blinked. The kid said the same thing he did. How-?

Jeremy nodded, bouncing lightly on his feet. “See you later, Mr. Schmidt. Thank you, for everything.” And then he was gone, into the building with a tiny click that meant the doors were locked.

Mike swallowed hard, looking at the dark, dark building that had swallowed the little guy up.

“Good luck, Jeremy.”

 

END

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on Tumblr: December 2, 2014
> 
> Bones' backstory for Jeremy had been mostly overwritten by my backstory for Probie, so I needed to come up with a new way for Jeremy and Mike to meet.


End file.
